The Lotos Club—so named for Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s poem “The Lotos-Eaters”—was founded in 1870 by a group of young writers, journalists, and critics. According to the club’s constitution, it sought to promote and develop “literature, art, sculpture, music, architecture, journalism, drama, science, education and the learned professions,” to encourage the professionals who work in these fields, and “provide a place of assembly for them and other persons interested in and sympathetic to them, their objectives, effort, and work.” The Club featured a roster of recognizable names, including author Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain); art collector and philanthropist Solomon R. Guggenheim; 34th United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower; writer, director, and actor Orson Welles; newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst; and steel magnate Charles M. Schwab. Though membership was originally limited to men, the club began admitting women in 1977, welcoming opera singer Marilyn Horne, writer Mary Higgins Clark, and actress Angela Lansbury, among others. The club remains in existence today, at 5 E. 66th Street, and forms part of New York City’s long history of private clubs.

Lotos Club, ca. 1909. Established as gentleman's club for those interested in literature, science and the fine arts in 1870, the Lotos Club—named after a feature in a Tennyson poem—has called a number of buildings home in its nearly 150 year history. The club's first home was at 2 Irving Place. Mark Twain was an early member of the organization. After a series of moves that had the club inching further uptown, the first true clubhouse was purchased in 1893 at 558 Fifth Avenue. In 1909, with the financial support of Andrew Carnegie (who was a member), the club moved into a headquarters specifically designed for their purpose at 110 West 57th Street. Designed by architect Donn Barber, the Italian Renaissance was lauded as beautiful with features painted in orange, blues, and greens and multi-toned grey brick. The building became a venue at the forefront of arts and culture in the city, presenting fine art exhibits and lectures by renown orators. The club knuckled though the Depression with downsized events but they completed paying off their mortgage in 1941 (which they celebrated by burning the paperwork in their oversized fireplace). By 1945 the Lotos Club was looking to downsize and moved into a Beaux-Arts building 5 East 66th Street. They made $166,000 on a building that had cost them $750,000 in 1909. The building was largely striped down to its steel framing in 1949 and had a new modern facade installed as it was being converted into offices. Since the mid 1960s it has been the home of the Directors Guild of America.